Batis Books is proud to announce the release dates for our first three titles – Dayspring by C. J. (Jonty) Driver, Chatsworth by Pravasan Pillay, and Inheritance by Athambile Masola.

Dayspring, a posthumous memoir by C. J. Driver edited by his lifelong friend J. M. Coetzee, is scheduled for release on 16 February 2026 in the UK and Ireland.

Dayspring was first published in 2024 in South Africa by Karavan Press and our sister press, uHlanga. A relatively humble release in Cape Town nevertheless resulted in it being named as one of New Statesman’s 2024 Books of the Year, nominated by Lyndall Gordon. Now the story of the formation of this extraordinary and influential poet, activist and educator will be available in Ireland and the UK, where Driver spent the balance of his life after being stripped of his South African citizenship by the apartheid regime.

Chatsworth, a kaleidoscopic collection of short stories from a Durban-Indian township by Pravasan Pillay, is scheduled for 16 March 2026 in the UK and Ireland.

Chatsworth brings a sprawling but marginalised working-class community to vibrant and humourous life, in authentic Indian-Durban speech and beautiful, pared-back prose. Amateur ghost-hunters, dodgy lodgers and rebellious preteens are just some of the unforgettable characters that inhabit Pillay’s stories, which we are proud to be bringing out in the UK and Ireland after Chatsworth's success in South Africa and Pillay’s adopted home of Sweden.

Inheritance, a poetry collection full of personal yearning and trenchant social critique by Athambile Masola, releases on 13 April 2026 in South Africa, the UK and Ireland.

Inheritance is Masola’s translation of Ilifa, her debut collection of poetry in her home language of isiXhosa, which was published by uHlanga in 2021. Garnering national attention and prestigious awards, and already a landmark in modern Xhosa literature, Masola’s poetry expands on a storied literary tradition to boldly question the meanings of love and freedom in a society that is hostile to women in general and Black women in particular.

This edition, which will be our first book sold in both the South African and UK-Irish markets, will be in a dual-language edition, presented with the original isiXhosa text, and includes an essay by the author on the politics and practicalities of translation. (As such, it will be one of the very few texts in isiXhosa to be commercially published in the UK.)

Please be in touch with us for any queries, including requests for review copies.